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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/24566617">Cruelty in Kindness</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/LadyRWidow/pseuds/LadyRWidow'>LadyRWidow</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Windwalker AU [2]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Avatar: The Last Airbender</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Culture Shock, Gen, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Non-Consensual Drug Use, Windwalker AU, but you didn't hear it from me, the Windwalkers are a C u l t</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-06-06</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-06-06</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-04 03:26:59</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Mature</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Graphic Depictions Of Violence, No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>3,788</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/24566617</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/LadyRWidow/pseuds/LadyRWidow</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Aang's first few weeks to his first few months with the Windwalker sect. There are some good times, and there are some bad (and under it all, there is fear).<br/>or<br/>Aang learns (not to ask questions).</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Windwalker AU [2]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/1748830</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>3</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>37</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Cruelty in Kindness</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Windwalker AU - This starts out fairly ok in terms of how traumatized Aang is going to be, but it goes from a 5 to a 10 real quick towards the end I am /sorry/</p><p>And, yes, parenthesis is older!Aang looking back.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>He didn’t remember much of the first few weeks. He had flashes of adjusting to the rougher fabric of his new robes and how they suffocated him more than not. The most prominent impression he had of those days was that there was always someone holding his hand and speaking gently to him. She insisted he call her A’ma and it took him too long to realize that meant mother.</p><p>Aang felt like a toddler or worse, a fragile teacup. They barely let him do anything on his own and constantly fed him tea that made his head go foggy. A’ma sang to him and told so many stories. </p><p>
  <em> (His favorite was the serpent and the badgermole, and somehow she knew that because by the first year he heard it more times than he could count. He wished that he could hear it one more time...) </em>
</p><p>The woman who had taken him was always there, whether it be holding his hand or lingering in the corner of his vision when they finally start letting him wander. She never told him her name and he had to find out through casual conversation and repetition that it was <em> Sangmu </em>. Her sleeved arm was almost always either wrapped around his or draped across his shoulder. </p><p>“Yun-Ji,<em> ----- </em> help me with the tent?” </p><p>A slightly older girl with dark hair perked up and bounded to the elder struggling to undo the twine binding the fabric to the wooden supports. Her “Mother” was a woman much older than Sangmu with tightly woven locks and a similar black sash wrapped around her waist. Aang was surprised when the A’ma… allowed the girl to go without a second glance. Would he be given the same allowances too? </p><p>After helping take down and wrap up the main supports for transport, she glanced over to him… - or was she looking to Sangmu... he didn’t remember the last time someone had looked to <em> him </em> for answers - with curious eyes. She glanced over to the woman she was assisting in deference. The elder responded by giving a sharp nod before going back to packing the rest of the fabric. The dark haired girl straightened herself before leaping over to them, faint billows of air surrounding her as she landed. Stopping at a respectable distance she bowed low, far lower than Aang had ever been forced to bow to the Elders of the air temples. </p><p>“Can Aang play with me Ge A’ma? I’ve finished my chores and the watchers will make sure we don’t get into any trouble.” </p><p>Her wording was careful and controlled, tone inches away from placating. Aang wondered if it was necessary. </p><p>(<em> Yes, yes it was, he he had discovered when he watched a Ge A’ma drag one of the unrulier children away and when they came back - </em> )</p><p>Like most of the windwalker airbenders, Aang noticed a hint of steel in her eyes and instinctively pressed in closer to Sangmu. He faintly wondered if there was something around the camp that he could do to escape this (<em> as if they would let him help </em>).</p><p>Sangmu hummed, looking down at him with sharp eyes. One hand came up cup his cheek to make sure he wouldn’t look away. </p><p>
  <em> He felt bruised and slashed, unable to heal with the open wounds that they had purposely salted to keep from healing.  </em>
</p><p>Whatever she saw in his eyes seemed to soften her. The caretaker gave him a smile that sent dull pangs of homesickness through his stomach, threatening to return the nausea that had been plaguing him most days since leaving the temple.  </p><p>“Very well, but be careful. He is still not feeling well” The younger airbender didn’t notice the knowing look his A’ma threw at the girl, too busy being indignant (<em> it was the first time he had gotten even vaguely angry since - </em>).</p><p>“I’m not de`v- sick,” Aang shot at his caretaker, stammering over the dialect. He was still having trouble speaking it, but over time had become much better at understanding.They refused to respond when he spoke the air dialect. </p><p>He felt ridiculously unbalanced when she pushed him gently forward into the older girls hands. He barely had time to feel the loss before an unnaturally warm hand grabbed his own and pulled him away from Sangmu. </p><p>
  <em> Take him back take him back - </em>
</p><p>“Come on! You spend too much time clinging to Ge A’mas’ robes.”  </p><p>Aang looked up in confusion, offense slowly seeping into his awareness. Everything was so slow these days. </p><p><em> It isn’t like I’m allowed to do anything else, </em> he thought bitterly. Out loud, he said: “It’s not like there’s anything else to do!” </p><p>Yun-Ji laughed and Aang’s eyebrows came together at how hollow it sounded. Her hand tightened around his wrist and for a second he thought he saw… concern in her eyes? </p><p>
  <em> Or was it fear. </em>
</p><p>“There’s plenty to do! And if Ge A’ma said you weren’t ready then you weren’t ready. They know what’s best.” </p><p>There was a thinly veiled warning in between her words. She had seen the bitterness in his eyes and read the lines of his frown. Maybe before he’d been given to the windwalkers he wouldn’t have noticed, but he realized that like the air nomads, the windwalkers rarely said what they meant the first time. </p><p>(<em> And they gave you less and less chances to get it right the longer you were with them </em>) </p><p>Though, he would have preferred proverbs to reading in between the lines. It required more thinking than he was capable of doing half of the time. He got tired so easily these days. </p><p>Knowing what was good for him, Aang shut his mouth and silently let himself be led through the campsite. He was dragged to nearly the edges before he was able to wonder if - </p><p>“Are we allowed this far?” </p><p>The girl’s face twisted slightly, as if thinking about the question was particularly hard before she shrugged and grinned down at him. </p><p>“If we weren’t allowed, we would've been stopped.” She tilted her head subtly to the left and Aang finally noticed two men sitting a short distance away from them, staffs draped across their lap. It didn’t look like they were watching; but, then again, the air nomad children used to say that windwalkers had a dozen hidden eyes and sharpened teeth to best eat you with. </p><p>(<em> Which was ridiculous, reflecting back. Windwalkers that filed their teeth to a point didn’t do it to consume human flesh…however,  it hadn’t stopped them from using them in combat </em>)</p><p>She came to a ridge and perched on a cluster of large stones that looked dangerously unstable. Aang was carefully pulled down to sit in front of her. Looking around with cautious curiosity, Aang noticed a small group of people in the distance fitted in desert appropriate clothing traveling with crates and a small herd of animals. </p><p>“We spend most of the spring near the western borders of Gaipan before migrating east.” Aang turned back to Yun-Ji in time to see her pulling out a small bag. “You’ll notice a lot of traders and nomads on the roads. We do some business with them sometimes but not very often.” </p><p>Her gaze hardened for a moment, glaring at them as if they were something particularly unpleasant or beneath her. Aang hesitantly raised a hand, reaching out a couple times before losing the nerve and shrinking back into himself. The way she glared at them made the hair on his arms stand on edge and chills run down his back. </p><p>He cleared his throat, before coughing more obviously in an attempt to turn her attention away from the other travelers, sounding stupidly fake. </p><p>She blinked in some shock, looking back at him with concern. She glanced over, lightning quick, to the watchmen before reaching over to pat him on the back. “You ok?” </p><p>Aang looked at her in confusion. It hadn’t even been that much of a cough - and had been a pathetic excuse for one - but a quick look to the watchful airbender guards saw the way they had straightened their spines despite seemingly not paying them any mind. </p><p>“Yeah, of course! I was just clearing my throat,” Aang tried weakly, feeling genuinely bewildered at the reaction. </p><p>She glanced back to give the traders a final glare before turning back to give her fellow airbender a companionable and commiserating smile, as if he was supposed to know why she had stared at them like they were some offensive bug to be stomped into the dirt <em> (there was relief there, if he had known to look for it) </em>. </p><p>Marbles spilled out when the string was untied. Some of them were scuffed and well used while others were newer and had brighter coloring. </p><p>“We trade with the local landowners if we can help it and the merchants for whatever else we need.” </p><p>A mixture of red and reflected light glimmered as the girl bended them into a pile. For a moment Aang could have mistaken them for droplets of pomegranate juice (<em> Aang hadn’t been able to notice when he’d start slipping in those days </em>). </p><p>“By the time winter rolls around we’re closer to the bordering island villages of the Kamu region. You’ll love it there. It’s warm year round even in the dead of night.”</p><p>Aang blinked, lips pressed together as he tried to process the information thrown at him. He barely kept himself from shaking his head, his eyelids trembling slightly against the struggle to keep them open for a moment. He reached out to help sort the marbles while his new friend drew a circle around the glass pieces. </p><p>“Aren’t the Kamu islands in the Fire Nation?”  </p><p>Yun-Ji seemed disappointed, a barely detectable slanting of the eyes giving her away. He couldn’t help but hike his shoulders up to his ears. </p><p><em> Wrong question </em>.</p><p>He tried again. “What do we trade?” </p><p>There was no expressive display of whether or not he had gotten it right this time, but the disappointed verging on holier than thou eyes had stopped so Aang would take it as a win. </p><p>“We do a lot of beadwork and make big batches of dried or powdered fruits and vegetables. You’ll love the Baiyu Hills. We camp in a small glade with a bunch of fig and apricot trees and spend most of the summer picking and drying out the fruit.” The girl twirled her fingers and twisted her hand, a small controlled gust of air hitting one of the marbles. She pouted when she realized that it hadn’t gone out of the circle. </p><p>The game was a training exercise in disguise. Any airbender could put out powerful gusts of wind able to knock someone to the ground, but it was a practiced, disciplined airbender that was able to make the tiniest gusts of wind with the precise amount of power behind it to send the object flying the short distance out of the circle.</p><p>Straightening up, she sighed and gave Aang a grand gesture, as if to say ‘your turn’. </p><p>“We also travel near the oceans for a few months every year. You wouldn’t imagine how much powdered sea shell sells on the market inland.” She pressed her mouth together as her tongue twisted on the first try and had to repeat “sea shell sells” to herself another time to get it right.</p><p>Aang didn't fare much better than Yun-Ji, flicking a marble off the ridge and bouncing on the stones by accident, his vision blurring for a moment before going back to mostly normal. Zero points for the both of them. </p><p>
  <em> The colors were bright again. </em>
</p><p>“Wool and knitted or raw threads are pretty common year round because we can get a decent haul when we shear the koala sheep,” she continued, letting out a small cheer when she finally was able to get a marble a few inches outside of the chalkline, barely legal but it counted. </p><p>“That’s… cool,” he replied weakly, for lack of anything better to say. </p><p>
  <em> Was it just him or were the trees breathing.  </em>
</p><p>“You’ll learn how to make the twine first and then learn how to knit and sew. Your Ge A’ma is a seamstress, after all.” </p><p>Aang frowned at the statement. “What does that have to do with anything?” </p><p>The girl looked at him blankly before reaching out and shooting a marble just within legal bounds.</p><p>“Since Ge A’ma is a seamstress, when you’re done with all your Avatar nonsense you’ll be one too.” </p><p>“I don’t... get to choose?” Disbelief warred with anger and settled into a pit of <em> wrong bad wrong bad </em> in his stomach at the confused look the girl sent him. </p><p>“Why would you want to choose?” She said it in a way, willow-like and carefully delicate, that disturbed the younger airbender. The blank expression on her face was becoming familiar to him when he hit a topic that wasn’t meant to be discussed and just <em> was </em>.  </p><p>It was their traditions. And now they were his. </p><p>The whole “Respect your Elders” with a capital R was never something Aang had taken very seriously. The more he learned about his new home, the more it became very apparent that Respect was a very serious cultural aspect with his new sect… one that had serious repercussions if not properly followed. </p><p>(<em> Aang had not been very good at following the rules and being new hadn’t spared him his earned suffering, though rarely direct </em>) </p><p>Aang’s knee shook in agitation. Everything still felt so foreign and wrong to him. Not even the tea they fed him could completely dull the anxiety that the change brought to him (<em> and he was supposed to represent change, air was supposed to be the embodiment of change, so why was it so hard for him </em>). </p><p>He needed answers that no one was willing to give. But he wasn’t going to stop trying (yet). </p><p>“When are they going to stop giving me that stuff that makes me sick and tired all the time?” </p><p>Her eyes flashed with an emotion that the boy didn’t recognize and for a second, Aang felt like he was choking. She didn’t respond to the question for a moment, instead flicking another marble out of the circle. 0 to 3. </p><p>Despite the pressure, Aang remained unmoved.</p><p>“The tea is medicinal. Coming down from living in the mountains to living on low land is hard on the body. When you’re ready to come off it, you’ll know.” </p><p>Aang heard no lies and deflated somewhat. The windwalkers hadn’t actually <em> done </em> anything to hurt him or earn his distrust. Aang hated that so much of his prejudice was based on the stories that the air nomads used to tell and that it colored his judgment of his new people. </p><p>
  <em> (Just because he didn’t hear a lie didn’t mean that it was true - windwalkers lied like they breathed) </em>
</p><p>It was to help him. </p><p>
  <em> (Then why was he still so so sick years after) </em>
</p><p>He hadn’t been giving them a fair chance. Sure, they would be scary, but they had taken him in so easily and didn’t treat him any differently from the other children. </p><p>(<em> They didn’t call him ‘Avatar Aang’ after that first day and he was still so grateful that he almost forgave them for what came after </em>)</p><p>He couldn't help but try again, but this time with a more reasonable (safer) question. “When will I start my airbending training?” </p><p>“What do you think this is,” she quipped, smirking as another marble was flicked out of the ring (0 to 4). </p><p>He gave her a deadpanned glare, not at all falling for it. “I think this is me getting my butt kicked at marbles.” Aang hadn’t even gotten a second turn, he barely kept himself from whining. Getting beat at pai sho by Gyatso was bearable, but this? Aang would have buried his head in the dirt if the plants wouldn’t have wailed at him for disturbing them (<em>they were bleeding blue and red and Aang was careful to keep his hands in his lap and breathe, in and out </em>). </p><p>“Can’t we play something more fun?” He airbended himself to his feet, wanting to go somewhere else, anywhere else. Seconds after, Aang was hit by a wave of nausea, dizziness overtaking his mind and causing him to stagger. </p><p>When Aang came to, he was on his knees dry heaving, a soothing hand on his back.</p><p>“I think that is enough for today.” </p><p>Her inflection was as calm and poised as Aang had ever known it to be, but somehow he could feel the pure <em> rage </em> radiating from his caretaker.</p><p><em> A’ma </em>, he whimpered reaching out blindly to cling to her robes. He barely caught on, a finger catching on the coarse fabric. </p><p>“I’m sorry Ge A’ma, I should have stopped him.” </p><p>“Yes, you should have.” </p><p>Aang felt a chill up his spine that had nothing to do with the nausea that still hit him in weaker waves. He looked up to be faced with a disapproving stare that was not directed at him, but to the bowed head of Yun-Ji. </p><p>“It wasn’t her fault,” he weakly protested. He yanked at Sangmu’s robes, trying to pull himself closer to her. “I wasn’t thinking, I should have been more careful.” </p><p>He was so so tired, tired enough not to question the tilt of her head in what he took for understanding.</p><p>Things were fuzzy for a few days after that. He was aware enough to know that they had set him in one of the carts and were moving somewhere. Yun-Ji had said something about Bayou Hills, was that where they were going?  </p><p>
  <em> A’ma sang to him and Aang clung to it, no matter how morbid the songs became.  </em>
</p><p>The next time he saw Yun-Ji, the girl was on laundry duty with Ge A’ma and the woman was sporting bandages around her neck and on the visible parts of her arms where her sleeves had been pulled up to keep from getting wet. Sangmu didn’t have a scratch on her, but the vindicated air around her was telling.</p><p>Yun-Ji didn’t seem very different. In fact, she kept approaching him and that confused Aang. </p><p>(<em>She had her reasons, she had a thousand reasons, and Aang both hated and loved her for them </em>)</p><p>When he looked at the girl’s Ge A’ma, she seemed peaceful and supportive of their continued friendship. It helped that everyone was so… nice? </p><p>They regularly interacted with him and when he was again allowed out from under A’ma’s arm, some of them sat him down and showed him how to perform the chores that were expected of him. </p><p>Yashehn taught him to set up a tent and take it down. </p><p>Lao shoved a washboard into his hands and showed him how to clean his clothes. </p><p>Aisa taught him how to braid in the windwalker fashion, nevermind that he refused to grow hair himself and his hands trembled and tangled in the hair more times than not.</p><p>His hands were rubbed raw each day, having never been subjected to such hard work. His sect members carefully issued corrections and lightly praised his successes. It took longer for them to react to his failures, pausing for a few seconds before forcing him to repeat the task until he’d done it right. </p><p>For a while, he forgot he was the Avatar and it faded out into the background, a low constant humming that he was content to ignore. </p><p>He played with Yun-Ji in the sand dunes while they were still in the deserts, getting caught in quicksand which, on another note, was a lie. There was nothing quick about it and he almost threw a fit from the disappointment. </p><p>(<em>He remembered that conversation and stood by it: “What, did you want to die?” “No! It’s the principle of it, the principle!"</em>)</p><p>He snuck around to climb up the mountains when they passed by them. He... may have almost been burned to a crisp by a dragon for that one. A’ma had scruffed him by the back of his neck for the stunt (<em> she had been dangerously silent and Aang had trembled under her hand for some reason - she hadn’t hurt him then but something in him had </em> known). </p><p>He didn’t stop seeing flowers bloom where they shouldn’t have or the plants <em> breathing </em> and <em> whispering to each other </em>like they were living enough to comprehend what that meant. </p><p>He confused colors some days and wondered why a dried mango tasted purple, remarking it to his partner in crime. She had looked at him with a faintly understanding not-grin and had remarked that it had always tasted green to her. </p><p>They got into an argument about what color the fruits tasted like and it resulted in a day or two where they’d turned their noses at the sight of the other. </p><p><em> (In retrospect, it was ridiculous, but Aang had been 10, surely some indignities could be forgiven - besides, it wasn’t like she was able to share her side of the story now and she was dead she was dead everyone was </em> <b> <em>dead</em> </b>)</p><p>No one mentioned the collecting scratching and bruising that appeared on Yun-Ji’s Ge A’ma and Aang wondered what he was doing wrong and then the air nomads were yelling at him about being a monster and -</p><p>Sangmu would put her hand on his shoulder and everything would be quiet. He would spend those horrible days clinging to her silently. </p><p>It was mundane. Everything became routine and days quickly turned into weeks. </p><p>(<em> He should have run before he let them touch him, but he saw them as people and he had loved them even before they forced him to love them </em>)</p><p>And they branded him. </p><p><em> They branded his very soul </em>. </p><p>He had sobbed and clutched onto his A’ma’s arms as pinpricks laced with ink that shouldn’t have touched his skin until he had mastered airbending (<em>he wasn’t an air nomad, could never be one </em> ). Every pinprick felt like a jagged needle threaded through his heart, his lungs, his stomach and he <em> screamed -  </em></p><p>
  <em> I thought you cared about me.  </em>
</p><p>It was unnatural</p><p>
  <em> Trembling arms and legs straining to get away, not able to budge as the needle tattooed his spine.  </em>
</p><p>It was cruel. </p><p>
  <em> In between his shoulders blades he bled the worse as they threaded themselves into his heart and his head until he couldn’t tell where they began and where he ended. </em>
</p><p>And he could feel… <em> everything </em>. </p><p>They loved him. <em>They loved him?  </em>They really really loved him. </p><p>
  <strike> But they cut out part of his heart and he’s still waiting for her he’s still waiting for him.  </strike>
</p><p>
  <em> He saw golden eyes encased in flames and he screamed.  </em>
</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>The guards and most of the other members of the sect are keeping very careful watch of Aang during this period of time for a few reasons.<br/>1) To make sure that the drug they're feeding him doesn't kill him and watch for the extreme side effects in the case they have to intervene.<br/>2) To establish names to faces and make sure Aang is close and personal with all the members of the sect. To humanize them and establish a family relation (so that when they bound themselves to him he wouldn't resist too much). </p><p>I'll write more about the bond in a later fic.</p></blockquote></div></div>
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